I am most always a traditionalist. Once a movie or song has been successfully filmed or recorded, I find the quality of re-makes to be great disappointments. There are for me two exceptions, one a movie, the other a song.
The 1983 movie version of Dickens’ Christmas classic A Christmas Carol that starred George C. Scott as Scrooge remains the finest version I have seen, surpassing all predecessors. George Jones, widely acclaimed as one of if not the greatest country singers in history, recorded “A Picture of Me Without You”. Some time later another legend of country music, Lorrie Morgan, daughter of legendary country singer George Morgan, re-recorded the song. In my opinion, the quality of Lorrie Morgan’s version did great justice to Jones’ version.
The lyrics of the song envision a lover asking the beloved to imagine the world without certain things assumed or taken for granted, such as:

. . . a world where no music was playing
. . . a church with nobody praying
. . . a sky with no blue
. . . a garden where nothing was growing
. . . a river where nothing was flowing
. . . a red rose unkissed by the dew
. . . Heaven with no angels singing
. . . Sunday morning with no church bells ringing

The final picture in the lyrics is possibly most poignant of all.

If you’ve watched as the heart of a child breaks in two
Then you’ve seen a picture of me without you.

I ask you now, Dear Reader, to look at the world in another way. Imagine a world without:

Television
Penicillin
Polio shots
Frozen foods
Xerox
Contact lenses
Frisbees
Laser beams
Ball-point pens
Air conditioners
Dishwashers
Gay-rights
Computer-dating
Dual careers
Daycare centers
Group therapy

This was a world in which:

Space travel was only in Flash Gordon books
Serving your country was a privilege; living in this country was a bigger privilege
Draft dodgers were those who closed front doors as the evening breeze started
Anything with “Made in Japan” on it was junk
There were 5 &10-cent stores where you could actually buy things for 5 and 10 cents Ice-cream cones, phone calls, rides on a streetcar, and a Pepsi were all a nickel
A nickel would buy enough stamps to mail 1 letter and 2 postcards
A new Ford Coupe cost $600, though few could afford one
Gasoline cost 11 cents a gallon
"Rock music" was your grandmother's lullaby
"Aids" were helpers in the Principal's office
"Chip" meant a piece of wood
"Hardware" was found in a hardware store
"Software" wasn't even a word
A “mouse” was a rodent

Dear Reader, this world actually existed. This is the way a grandfather described to his grandson how things were in the United States in 1947, the year the grandfather was born!

Anyone want to take a trip back in time in my travel machine? (Oops, sorry! That invention must be patent pending.)

I leave you with a few additional thoughts from emails of the past.

When you are dissatisfied and would like to go back to youth,
think of Algebra.

As I watch this generation try to rewrite history,
one thing I am sure of is
that it will be misspelled and have no punctuation.

If your electric car runs out of power on the interstate,
do you walk to a charging station to get a bucket of electricity?

I want my children to have all the things I couldn't afford.
Then I want to move in with them.
--Phyllis Diller